Fuel tank and back bay new cross member support

Heres a veiw from the drivers side boogie wheel area.

That fuel tank support was no match for big bertha.

Ok its gone and the new ones in. I thought that this was going to be a month long project. As it turned out I cut the steel parts out friday night after work then saturday morning I welded them all together and saturday afternoon I strugled all day getting the other torsion spring and axel out. then sunday I pluged up big bertha and let her rip ....lol.... If I can keep up this pace (and I say if ...lol.) I will have the steel work done in about a month. I have the engine ready to pull out now so that will help alot to get it out of the way.

This is going to suck.....

Oh well its gotta go. Now wheres those sky hooks......

Here is the new fuel tank cross member

I thought I would try and weld up the last remaining cross members (3) on the bench and this is the first. I will try this one out and see how it goes. Sure is easier on the back welding like this. Now its time to go eat some more rust pie....lol...

New rear cap and steel (as seen from inside)

Here I have the new cap and extended steel started. I had to have an eleven guage peice of sheet steel broke in three places to form the back wall so while the sheet metal guys are doing this I will go on to cut out some more rust. I cant wait!!!!!

Adding a new roof rib

I got the back bows bent up by Eagle in Texas and had them make me a couple of extras in case I screwed up one. Just so happened that they were close enough to modify for the roof bows. Here you can see the stretch in the roof. the gap in the roof is the stretch less the over lap normaly for the cap.

S-T-R-E-T-C-H-I-N-G the back of the bus

I am extending the back of the bus for future engine mods. The extra length is about a foot.

Rear cradle support wall done

For a time frame, it took about 24 man hours work for the plywood insert and new steel here.

Rear steel in the radiator bay

New steel for rear of air conditioner bay

Here is a close up of the new steel. As you can see last years steel on the walls has already started to rust. It is only surface rust but, it still is aggrivating to see it get rusty again. Now wheres my spray gun and that rust bullet at.....lol....

Straightening up the butt end of the bus

I true squared two peices of plywood at 90 degrees and put the two together. I trued them at the widest point of the bus (the bottom) then I cut the taper off of each side (1/2 inch top to floor level) with a straight edge and flush router bit. All the while being careful of my mesurments to get a very snug fit. I found that cross measuring for square was not working out with the tapered walls. After I cut out the plywood insert I took my two ton rachet strap and pulled the rear into alignment two get the plywood in place. Once I had it back where it belonged I welded the two angles in place to hold it there as I want to remove the plywood to weld in the new support steel for the rear cap. Important to note all this took place before any of the steel below the plywood was put in place as that is part of what holds the rear of the motor in place.

Engine cradle rust (typical)

As you can see the cradle is allmost gone. Look closely and you can see where I hit the shackle mount with a very, and I do mean very, light tap of a hammer and knocked a hole right into it. All of these parts are available at Silver Eagle and I will be replacing them to keep this bus up off of my toes...lol... Also take note of the down tube above that, well, the one that should be there that is completly rusted away now.

Here's all my help on break ... lol....

After studying the rear of this bus for about 2 weeks and coming to an understanding of what each and every peice of the tube frame does and how the rust affected the bus as each one rusted apart I found these problem areas. The engine cradle had droped straight down about 1/2 inch in the front. down about 3/4 inch on the passenger side rear and down 1 inch on the drivers side rear. As the motor pulled at the framing it buckled the walls at the drive axels (allready repaired) and pulled apart the weak portions of the crossmembers for the drive axels. This in turn pulled off one of the shackles that held up the torsion spring on the drive axel. All this in turn is the reason I am rebuiling the whole drive line portion of the steel box tubing. I have studyed hours upon hours to determine where it should be and how it should be rebuilt to get back to where it was when new and to beef it up and get rid of the voids that trap debris and water to create rust problems. It just amazes me that this bus was still on the highway. Even more stupid was I when I crawled all under this bus after I bought it. Can someone say Daaaaaa for me.

Drivers side rear corner

This is typical of a prerepair pic on this particular bus. Here I have removed the rear electrical panel in preparation for cutting off the entire rear portion of the bus.

Down tube

Here's a prime example of why I havent bothered to block up any portion of the bus as of yet. There just aint nothing left to hold it up. So I just continue to use my reliable sky hooks.

Rear wiring panel box

Pat, I will have to ask you 1000 ?'s here. This will be the "fun" stuff. I just hate the steel crap for right now.

Air intake and coolant fil tank

I wonder what the copper tank would look like polished???? Humm...???

More ....... rust....Air cleaner hanger prerepair pic

thought I would put up some of these rusty pics for comparison later. You guys wont believe the difference new steel and rust bullet makes here.